BumpInTheNight:Anything that kills the used games market is good to me. Pay the developers you cheap jerks, and if you don't want to pay full price then wait for it to go on sale.

Yeah. And buy nothing but brand-new cars from now on. Think of all those people in the manufacturing sector who miss out every year because those cheap jerks bought used cars. Let's not forget all the architects put out of work by people buying pre-owned houses. And I don't even want to get into how much I hate it when people lend each other books.

You know what really honked me off? I wound up at this place called a "pawn shop," and it was full of used stuff. Clothes, electronics, guitars, movies... I kept thinking to myself, "you cheap jerks! Gibson isn't making any money from the sale of that guitar!"

way south:PsyLord: Am I the only person that thinks that subby confused the next xbox with the PS4?*reads the article*Sonuva... whoever implements this will the the company that I will boycott.

Meh, I don't see why anyone should bother.

I mean, fark gamestop. They ripoff gamers to milk money from the industry while producing nothing. The next entity that needs to be farked over is walmart, and then the publishers themselves. They encourage physical media and exert arbitrary design influence because gamers are too stupid to download product strait from the developers.

Screw the lot of them.Buy strait from the console maker, buy it online, and maybe (just maybe) they'll get the hint that these three groups of leeches need to die.

We live in an age where you can get content strait from the mouth of its creator with very few middlemen. Why should I boycott the future to preserve the lifestyle of the most middlest men in the industry?

Because you don't want to cut off your nose to spite your face?

No used sales means no Gamestop, sure. It also means no mom-and-pop shops, no selling your old games on eBay, and no trading games with your friends. Depending on how it's handled, it may even mean no bringing your games to your friend's house (unless you bring your console too). It also means that every game will be an ultimately transient medium, impossible to preserve for future generations. It means no finding a game in a thrift store 10-20 years down the road, saying, "Say, I always wanted to try this," then taking it home, going up in the attic, blowing the dust off your Xbox 720, and having a grand old time. It means that every cultural touchstone that we have as gamers disappears like dust in the wind as the games get discontinued.

BumpInTheNight:/if you support used games you are really supporting a vampiric business model called Gamestop, that's it.

No, that's not it. You're supporting a thousand mom-and-pop shops that make fark-all on new games and rely on used sales to keep the store open. You're supporting gamers who sell their old games on eBay so they can go buy new ones. You're supporting kids trading games for the weekend so they can try out a game they haven't played before. You're supporting rental services like GameFly.

And you're also supporting the dickbags at GameStop, sure. But I'm not willing to cut my nose off to spite my face.

This thread: "Yeah, if Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo refuse to let you play used games, then everybody would switch to Valve! Woohoo, hooray for Steam!"Reality: Valve sued in Germany over the Right to Resell Games "Because Valve forbids its users to sell or transfer their accounts to another person, the exchange of games that can only be played online is impossible, she said. This means that a Steam user only partially owns games, Elbrecht said. "If I pay the full price for a game, then why am I not allowed to do with it what I want," she added."

In an age where AAA game producers like Capcom are doing Day One DLC, on-disc characters, levels and endings that you have to pay to unlock or re-releasing an updated version of a game 6 months later, I have no doubt that this "rumor" will turn out to be true.

Someday we'll be telling our grandchildren of a time when video game companies sold you a game with all the content included. Then our grandkids will laugh in our faces and ask for $10 so they can unlock the second level of Resident Evil XLII.

Nah. I mean, what's going to replace them? Computers? People are getting away from desktops and laptops, and moving to tablets. And while stuff like Angry Birds is entertaining, there will still be demand for large, immersive games.

On the bright side, without the possibility of a used-game market, the initial cost of new games should drop, since software companies don't have to account for lost revenue from purchases on the second-hand market.

MrSteve007:That is pretty interesting. Looks like in a month or two, Windows 8 will have more Steam gamers on that platform than XP. Guess the haters are going to have to start eating crow about Win 8.

You mean the OS that comes pre-installed on every new PC sold is beating the OS that hasn't been sold in 3-4 years in a segment that is mostly focused on newer, high-end systems? No shiat, Sherlock.

RoxtarRyan:RoxtarRyan: ha-ha-guy: The carrot go install it would be the Linux version of Steam that offered exclusive features or titles the Windows 8 version of Steam lacked.

If they did that, then that is a prime example of one company trying to be the biggest douche they can. There is nothing in Win8 that stops Steam from functioning or working like Win7. I have it on my laptop, and Steam runs fine, no problems. This is them being pissy that MS is putting something with their OS that gives people another venue for purchasing 3rd party software. If anything else, that would drive people away from Steam to other companies like Direct2Drive, Gamers Gate, Amazon Game Downloads, etc. Why bother setting up a dual-boot to play games when there are companies who are more than happy to take your money without modifying your computer?

And even moreso when the usage of Steam on Win8 desktops is still increasing, according to the recent Steam H&S Survey.

That is pretty interesting. Looks like in a month or two, Windows 8 will have more Steam gamers on that platform than XP. Guess the haters are going to have to start eating crow about Win 8.

/Oh, that's cute, OSX almost has 3% and Linux is up to nearly 1% of gamers these days. Sounds about right.

Turn X-Box Live into a free service for all registered owners, follow Steam's lead as far as having frequent sales on fairly new titles, and I don't think you'll hear many people complaining THAT much when the dust settles.

Keep trying to nickel and dime your base, however, and charging $60 despite saving a good chunk of change on the lack of physical distribution, and MS deserves to be abandoned like a sinking ship.

If I had to guess I'd say this rumor was floated to gauge reaction and plant the idea for the future, not because it's likely to actually happen, but it's sort of a moot point. It's inevitable that at some point some asshole company will try it and succeed.

I'm guessing Ubisoft since that name is pretty much as synonymous with "asshole" as it can get when it comes to insanely stupid DRM schemes.

Gamers are about as masochistic of consumers as you can get. They'll biatch and moan and scream about every damn little thing to everybody who will listen, but they'll never actually stop buying their digital crank no matter what happens.

whistleridge: What are you talking about? Surely a huge computer corporation like MS would never make something that cost hundreds of dollars and then died after mere weeks due to shoddy components. Why, that would be unscrupulous!

I still say that it was the push for RoHS compliance that killed that.

BumpInTheNight:if you support used games you are really supporting a vampiric business model called Gamestop, that's it

Yes. That's the only way I could ever get used games. Certainly not from eBay. Or Amazon. Or from my friend who just sold me a few old GBA games. Or from the numerous places I get games for the many old systems I have, from NES to Dreamcast and beoynd. And I certainly never go to my friendly neighborhood locally-owned shops like "Mind Games" to get myself some old 16-bit action.

My old games certainly must all come from GameStop, a place I haven't bought from since 2010.

which means there's going to be a massive resurgence in computer gaming as consoles die a slow, strangled death.

I read a while back that Gamestop is seriously considering getting into the retro game business, which pisses me off royally. I'm selling most NES carts for effectively $2-$3 at best after shipping and before fees, and as soon as GS gets in, expect ebay to become a sudden storm of activity - both for civilians and for GS's future stock buyers outbidding the rest of us on just about everything.

BumpInTheNight:Anything that kills the used games market is good to me. Pay the developers you cheap jerks, and if you don't want to pay full price then wait for it to go on sale.

I downloaded games like a madman for about 10 years. Hundreds of games, dozens of "next big thing" games. about 7 percent were worth half of what they cost, and about 5% overall were worth their actual sticker price. With a "no return of opened software" policy, video game makers can eat a dick until they start putting out a decently priced quality product.

Weaver95:I mean i'm not saying companies like Sony aren't stupid enough to want to try something like this...i'm just saying this is still very much in the 'rumor' phase so lets not get all worked up about it till we hear something more solid and reliable.

Since Sony is unveiling the PS4 in a couple of weeks we'll know a lot more then.

This is so stupid I can't believe Sony would do it. In fact if Microsoft does do it, Sony would be stupid to do so as well as not doing so would give them an almost insurmountable (imho) advantage next-gen that would be too good to pass up.

I mean i'm not saying companies like Sony aren't stupid enough to want to try something like this...i'm just saying this is still very much in the 'rumor' phase so lets not get all worked up about it till we hear something more solid and reliable.

Weaver95:whistleridge: GAT_00: FirstNationalBastard: The new X-Box will fail.

Not when Sony does the same thing. Nintendo probably will too.

Yeah,,,not going to happen. Unlike a website paywall, which requires only a small investment and still doesn't pay off very well, this is a HUGE investment. And all the other guy has to do to kill you is say 'hey...no paywall'. End of game, right there.

No way this happens.

unless of course ALL the major companies get together and (illegally) collude to lock down the console gamer market and make 'paywalls' an industry wide standard.

but right now this is just a rumor. so, take it with a grain of salt.

And if they did that, then they would lose out to their own product. Remember how many years it took PS3 sales to get moving? Is the next system reallygoing to provide so much added value that people would just HAVE to upgrade, depite those restrictions? I doubt it.

I think if they do this, new platform sales are flat to nonexistent, existing platform sales stay robust, developers respond accordingly, and the platform companies take a hit until they agree to undo this stupid idea.

I just don't see any way this can succeed, no matter how much the manufacturers might want it to.

Yeah,,,not going to happen. Unlike a website paywall, which requires only a small investment and still doesn't pay off very well, this is a HUGE investment. And all the other guy has to do to kill you is say 'hey...no paywall'. End of game, right there.

We have not been able to confirm the veracity of this new report, which claims that Durango discs will ship with one-time-use activation codes that render them irrelevant to anyone but the person who first uses them.

Mugato:Weaver95: which means there's going to be a massive resurgence in computer gaming as consoles die a slow, strangled death.

I don't know about that. A good gaming setup is pretty expensive.

I am a die hard PC gamer but even I have to admit that consoles are going to be dominant for the next while in some form or another. The fixed hardware and controlled ecosystem is just too attractive to developers.

The fact is that if the idiots would put proper keyboard and mouse controls on the damn things I would probably use one myself. The games I play are orders of magnitude better with the proper controls.

My computer, not being very powerful, can't run skyrim, hell, sometimes it runs Fallout NV a little slow (renders distance like shiate, for example, since I need to zoom in to see a little bit beyond), and I really like RPGs, so I'm looking for an action RPG with freaking roleplaying elements to it, a decent story, and decent graphics. So far, I have Skyrim, but on the xbox, and NV. My guess it's possible get Fallout 3 (which I already beat), or either Oblivion or Morrowind, but any suggestions are welcome :) .

Felgraf:Why all the gamestop hate? Sure, the central office can be dicks, but sometimes the employees are damn good. The ones at my local shop are pretty friggen helpful, knowledgeable, and friendly to talk with-I have even seen them steer people away from crap games/games that they would likely not enjoy.

/I realize this is probably the exception to the rule.

My typical experience involves being told that I need to pre-order some game in a genre totally opposite from whatever I am buying. And getting 5 bucks off the full price of the game because it's used. Screw that.

I am surprised nobody has mentioned the recent ruling in Euroland that requires digital purchases to be transferable. I'm sure there is nothing that the EU courts would like to do more than fine Sony and MS a few billion dollars and THEN make them patch their hardware to allow consumers to transfer ownership.

The Larch:BumpInTheNight: mcreadyblue: moothemagiccow: ha-ha-guy: Never happen. Valve would (and likely is going to) just drop a gaming console based on *nix with commodity hardware and dominate the market.

Since when do people make games for Linux?

Linux pretty much is a game.

It does often remind me of Myst, that's for sure.

At least I could get the sound to work in Myst

Are you telling me that the next step of learning Linux is one of those damn sound puzzles??

GreenAdder:BumpInTheNight: Anything that kills the used games market is good to me. Pay the developers you cheap jerks, and if you don't want to pay full price then wait for it to go on sale.

Yeah. And buy nothing but brand-new cars from now on. Think of all those people in the manufacturing sector who miss out every year because those cheap jerks bought used cars. Let's not forget all the architects put out of work by people buying pre-owned houses. And I don't even want to get into how much I hate it when people lend each other books.

You know what really honked me off? I wound up at this place called a "pawn shop," and it was full of used stuff. Clothes, electronics, guitars, movies... I kept thinking to myself, "you cheap jerks! Gibson isn't making any money from the sale of that guitar!"

Not to mention, what kind of society do we live in where we should throw shiat away just because we've grown bored of it?

RoxtarRyan:Big_Fat_Liar: What drives me away from Steam is not being able to play games I already bought.

The only issue I've had like that with Steam was with the original Dragon Age. Bought it on Steam, the package with all the DLC, and there was an issue about 30 hours in where the DLC wasn't able to "phone home", causing all my game saves afterward to pretty much be corrupt. By the time I realized what happened, I logged another 50 hours in. Steam pointed their fingers at Bioware as the publisher, Bioware pointed fingers at Steam as the distributor, and nothing was done to fix it at all.

Odd, since my pirated copy with all the DLC worked just fine. Funny, since I pirated it first, but liked it so much I paid for it, only to have it not work.

No good deed goes unpunished. I bought some lazy console ports sequels that I had been excited about on Steam only to find out that I can't re-map the controls. That sh*t is f*cking infuriating. If I wanted to play it on a console, I would have bought it for one. The notion that it takes (usually multiple) patches to add something that seems to be little more than an afterthought for the developers.

Bought Darksiders II, and the controls are worthless. Pirated a couple of others to test only to find that the controls were similarly worthless. I foolishly thought that the updated version of DS II would have the control issues patched.

I have learned to pirate a game like that to test before actually buying it.

I highly doubt Nintendo will:a. The Wii U just came out.b. Nintendo is the one company with good business practices in the console market. They refused to release a WiiHD as they were uncomfortable with releasing a 'new' console just for graphical updates. They also announced they are expanding their development window for increased game quality, while many publishers have been shrinking them to fit with annual releases.

$ony on the other hand can be just as bad as M$. I hate the idea, and I imagine the sales of the consoles and the games will suffer.

I heard the next XBOX will kick your puppy and fark your significant other behind your back. It's rumored to be infested with several dozen antibiotic resistant strains of STD and contagious diseases and automatically removes 20% of your balance from your checking account per week. In addition, it contains a sensor that alerts the police any time it detects that you have a BAC above 0.08 or whenever there's any trace of illicit drugs. It also poops in your shoes.

way south:HeartBurnKid: way south: PsyLord: Am I the only person that thinks that subby confused the next xbox with the PS4?*reads the article*Sonuva... whoever implements this will the the company that I will boycott.

Meh, I don't see why anyone should bother.

I mean, fark gamestop. They ripoff gamers to milk money from the industry while producing nothing. The next entity that needs to be farked over is walmart, and then the publishers themselves. They encourage physical media and exert arbitrary design influence because gamers are too stupid to download product strait from the developers.

Screw the lot of them.Buy strait from the console maker, buy it online, and maybe (just maybe) they'll get the hint that these three groups of leeches need to die.

We live in an age where you can get content strait from the mouth of its creator with very few middlemen. Why should I boycott the future to preserve the lifestyle of the most middlest men in the industry?

Because you don't want to cut off your nose to spite your face?

No used sales means no Gamestop, sure. It also means no mom-and-pop shops, no selling your old games on eBay, and no trading games with your friends. Depending on how it's handled, it may even mean no bringing your games to your friend's house (unless you bring your console too). It also means that every game will be an ultimately transient medium, impossible to preserve for future generations. It means no finding a game in a thrift store 10-20 years down the road, saying, "Say, I always wanted to try this," then taking it home, going up in the attic, blowing the dust off your Xbox 720, and having a grand old time. It means that every cultural touchstone that we have as gamers disappears like dust in the wind as the games get discontinued.

But hey, Gamestop gets screwed. So there's that.

Reselling old disks won't drive content development or the technological infrastructure needed to keep new games coming.Yes this is bad for the ma and pa stor ...

You're so cute. You think they're actually going to pass the savings on to the end user.

Well looks like i won't be buying the next gen Xbox then nor Sony's offering if they stick with this cockamamie idea. Nintendo will never go for this so they will poised to take advantage if Sony and Microsoft shoot themselves in the foot.

Steam is great if you have a fast enough internet service to take advantage of it , i for one do not.

Surool:MrSteve007: /Oh, that's cute, OSX almost has 3% and Linux is up to nearly 1% of gamers these days. Sounds about right.

That is right. under 4% of gamers use those OSs for gaming. They either (A) Play Angry Birds-style games on tablets, or (B) have a game console. It has been that way since those OSs were invented, so I highly doubt the users give a f*ck about it. The ones that do dual boot their machines with a copy of Windows, so those figures aren't going to ever change for any reason.

... or maybe you're trying to look at a number on one service and extrapolate from there to all services. You know, 100% of users of the MacGameStore are on OSX. By your logic, no gamers use Windows.

Don't get me wrong, a large portion of gamers are on Windows, but another large portion are on Macs or on consoles. Using only one data source that misses those groups just results in invalid conclusions.

MrSteve007:HeartBurnKid: You mean the OS that comes pre-installed on every new PC sold is beating the OS that hasn't been sold in 3-4 years in a segment that is mostly focused on newer, high-end systems? No shiat, Sherlock.

Oh, how quickly the talking points change. Before it was: "Windows 8 isn't selling, it's a flop." MS then announces that it's selling as well as Win 7 did. The next excuse was "Those aren't real sales to consumers, it's just a bunch of licenses and boxes sitting on shelves." Then came "Well, it's selling on new systems, but people are wiping and installing Windows 7 instead!" excuse. And now we have "It's pre-installed on every new PC sold!" excuse.

So you're telling me that Windows 8 became 8% of the total computer gaming market in *3-months* purely because it's sold on new computers. Lol.

It's a Windows vs Windows flame war in a twisted panty fight to the death!

Big_Fat_Liar:What drives me away from Steam is not being able to play games I already bought.

The only issue I've had like that with Steam was with the original Dragon Age. Bought it on Steam, the package with all the DLC, and there was an issue about 30 hours in where the DLC wasn't able to "phone home", causing all my game saves afterward to pretty much be corrupt. By the time I realized what happened, I logged another 50 hours in. Steam pointed their fingers at Bioware as the publisher, Bioware pointed fingers at Steam as the distributor, and nothing was done to fix it at all.

Odd, since my pirated copy with all the DLC worked just fine. Funny, since I pirated it first, but liked it so much I paid for it, only to have it not work.

ladyfortuna:Weaver95: GAT_00: FirstNationalBastard: The new X-Box will fail.

Not when Sony does the same thing. Nintendo probably will too.

which means there's going to be a massive resurgence in computer gaming as consoles die a slow, strangled death.

I read a while back that Gamestop is seriously considering getting into the retro game business, which pisses me off royally. I'm selling most NES carts for effectively $2-$3 at best after shipping and before fees, and as soon as GS gets in, expect ebay to become a sudden storm of activity - both for civilians and for GS's future stock buyers outbidding the rest of us on just about everything.

/prediction//I could be wrong of course

If you don't mind me asking, where do you get your stock? Garage sales? Craigslist?

BumpInTheNight:I know the charges on my credit card are going to Valve not Bethesda but I do know inevitably some of it will make it back to Bethesda, unlike when you buy a used game from Gamestop

Do you own the games or not? If you own them, you can resell them. Period. That's what ownership means. If you take away that, then you don't own the product. At best, you are purchasing a lifetime use license.

Now, if the game companies want to go to a license/lease system, then fine. Let them be upfront about that and come up with a model that makes sense for such a system. Such a model should not be based around a point-of-sale concept, however.

But don't give me a hybrid system where I "buy" a product that I do not, in any meaningful sense of the word, own.

RoxtarRyan:ha-ha-guy: The carrot go install it would be the Linux version of Steam that offered exclusive features or titles the Windows 8 version of Steam lacked.

If they did that, then that is a prime example of one company trying to be the biggest douche they can. There is nothing in Win8 that stops Steam from functioning or working like Win7. I have it on my laptop, and Steam runs fine, no problems. This is them being pissy that MS is putting something with their OS that gives people another venue for purchasing 3rd party software. If anything else, that would drive people away from Steam to other companies like Direct2Drive, Gamers Gate, Amazon Game Downloads, etc. Why bother setting up a dual-boot to play games when there are companies who are more than happy to take your money without modifying your computer?

Fark accounts come with a handy Ignore Feature. Use it to filter out those posters whose comments you'd prefer not to read. Keep in mind that discussing who's on your ignore list is the opposite of ignoring. It crosses the line into trolling of other Fark members and may result in a suspension of posting privileges.

Meh.I never buy anything just released anyway. By the time I get around to buying something, the price of new or used is almost negligible. It's the same with Steam. I wait for sales with deep discounts. Either way, I win.

/In other words, I'm married.//Probably won't get a next gen console until at least 2 years after it's been released.

FuryOfFirestorm:In an age where AAA game producers like Capcom are doing Day One DLC, on-disc characters, levels and endings that you have to pay to unlock or re-releasing an updated version of a game 6 months later, I have no doubt that this "rumor" will turn out to be true.

Someday we'll be telling our grandchildren of a time when video game companies sold you a game with all the content included. Then our grandkids will laugh in our faces and ask for $10 so they can unlock the second level of Resident Evil XLII.

when I was a kid, new games were $70+ in 1991 currency, produced for meager budgets by meager teams, and often followed up with sequels not too long after, expansion packs, etc and so forth. Most games were, really, only about 4-5 hours long save for RPGS.

doczoidberg:if used games are no longer usable, I am done with any new gaming for good.

I'll keep playing the classic systems. There's enough from all the previous generations to keep me busy for

Gamestop is screwed no matter what. They are the Borders of video games. There's no need for them with streaming/cloud computing and all digital media. They know they are dying too, and just bleeding the last bit of profit they can before they become obsolete.Side note - take a look at how much of a the profit of Gamestop comes from 2nd hand sales. The answer is almost all of it.

cgraves67:Gonz: FirstNationalBastard: GAT_00: FirstNationalBastard: The new X-Box will fail.

Not when Sony does the same thing. Nintendo probably will too.

Okay, then platform gaming consoles will fail.

Either way.

Nah. I mean, what's going to replace them? Computers? People are getting away from desktops and laptops, and moving to tablets. And while stuff like Angry Birds is entertaining, there will still be demand for large, immersive games.

On the bright side, without the possibility of a used-game market, the initial cost of new games should drop, since software companies don't have to account for lost revenue from purchases on the second-hand market.

Or, to put it another way: you'll get over it.

I suspect YGOI is probably right, but on the other hand, tablets are only one killer app away from blowing the hell out of the console market. One compelling, deep, highly-replayable multiplayer game is all it would take to make ipads the must-have gaming platform. They're already ubiquitous. You just need a really addictive game to play on them.

Computers won't die because I've yet to find a tablet or console that could effectively play deep strategy games like my current obsession, Crusader Kings 2. Those kinds of games simply don't play on anything except desktops and laptops, and there is plenty of market for them.

magneticmushroom:ladyfortuna: I'm selling most NES carts for effectively $2-$3 at best after shipping and before fees, and as soon as GS gets in, expect ebay to become a sudden storm of activity - both for civilians and for GS's future stock buyers outbidding the rest of us on just about everything.

/prediction//I could be wrong of course

I collect NES games. You got an ebay store you could link to? Or would you like to do some private selling?

/I need those damn cartridges.

Clicky-Profile :P

Honestly I expect I'll get out of the business in another year or so for various reasons (*cough FEEBAY, Paymenowpal), but it's allowed me to avoid having to take out a private loan while I'm back in school - I commute to school so gas & book money is super-important.

Dr Dreidel:BumpInTheNight: if you support used games you are really supporting a vampiric business model called Gamestop, that's it. If that didn't exist you would damn well find you could buy games at prices you want like the the Master Gaming Race can via steam. Do I buy a lot of games at the $60 mark? Nope. Do I buy a lot of first-hand games? Yep.

What about those of us who don't want to pay the "GOTTA HAVE IT NOWNOWNOW" premium, so we wait 3-6 months for the price to drop?

// just bought AC3 and Madden 13 for a combined $45// (obviously) not at Gamestop

Well yah that's pretty much what I'm doing, there's a lot of games that initially release for $60 but I'm not enticed enough to pay that much so I just wait a month or two, voila the price on steam goes down due to either a sale or the game's initial price point didn't accurately reflect the demand for it. Some publishers start games are a price lower then $60 right off the bat, its great. Either way I buy games for the prices I want and know that the profits from the sale go back to a platform that lets me do all of this from the comfort of my home and to the developers who provided the game.

/if you support used games you are really supporting a vampiric business model called Gamestop, that's it. If that didn't exist you would damn well find you could buy games at prices you want like the the Master Gaming Race can via steam. Do I buy a lot of games at the $60 mark? Nope. Do I buy a lot of first-hand games? Yep.

Adjusted for inflation, most SNES games cost around $80 new and some went well above $100. Charticle

BumpInTheNight:if you support used games you are really supporting a vampiric business model called Gamestop, that's it. If that didn't exist you would damn well find you could buy games at prices you want like the the Master Gaming Race can via steam. Do I buy a lot of games at the $60 mark? Nope. Do I buy a lot of first-hand games? Yep.

What about those of us who don't want to pay the "GOTTA HAVE IT NOWNOWNOW" premium, so we wait 3-6 months for the price to drop?

// just bought AC3 and Madden 13 for a combined $45// (obviously) not at Gamestop

...And fark this "always connected" bullshiat. My stepson's XBox kills the entire wireless connection for the house every time he connects, and I can't find a setting for bandwidth throttling in the router. If this piece of shiat gaming console is going to eat up everyone else's connection, then he can be off of it when he doesn't need the connection.

whistleridge:What are you talking about? Surely a huge computer corporation like MS would never make something that cost hundreds of dollars and then died after mere weeks due to shoddy components. Why, that would be unscrupulous!

Xbox spend $3bn replacing RROD'd consoles under extended warranties. they were under NO OBLIGATION to extend those warranties.

if you want an example of a corporation being evil you should not use a situation in which the company went above and beyond their obligations to replace out of warranty hardware as a warranty replacement.

Gonz:FirstNationalBastard: GAT_00: FirstNationalBastard: The new X-Box will fail.

Not when Sony does the same thing. Nintendo probably will too.

Okay, then platform gaming consoles will fail.

Either way.

Nah. I mean, what's going to replace them? Computers? People are getting away from desktops and laptops, and moving to tablets. And while stuff like Angry Birds is entertaining, there will still be demand for large, immersive games.

On the bright side, without the possibility of a used-game market, the initial cost of new games should drop, since software companies don't have to account for lost revenue from purchases on the second-hand market.

Or, to put it another way: you'll get over it.

I suspect YGOI is probably right, but on the other hand, tablets are only one killer app away from blowing the hell out of the console market. One compelling, deep, highly-replayable multiplayer game is all it would take to make ipads the must-have gaming platform. They're already ubiquitous. You just need a really addictive game to play on them.

GreenAdder:BumpInTheNight: Anything that kills the used games market is good to me. Pay the developers you cheap jerks, and if you don't want to pay full price then wait for it to go on sale.

Yeah. And buy nothing but brand-new cars from now on. Think of all those people in the manufacturing sector who miss out every year because those cheap jerks bought used cars. Let's not forget all the architects put out of work by people buying pre-owned houses. And I don't even want to get into how much I hate it when people lend each other books.

You know what really honked me off? I wound up at this place called a "pawn shop," and it was full of used stuff. Clothes, electronics, guitars, movies... I kept thinking to myself, "you cheap jerks! Gibson isn't making any money from the sale of that guitar!"

Got battletoads for the Wii in yet?

/if you support used games you are really supporting a vampiric business model called Gamestop, that's it. If that didn't exist you would damn well find you could buy games at prices you want like the the Master Gaming Race can via steam. Do I buy a lot of games at the $60 mark? Nope. Do I buy a lot of first-hand games? Yep.

SurfaceTension:Why isn't there a game system that institutes a pay-for-play system where you pay a small fee to get the game, but each time you start the game, the system has to be connected to the internet and you pay a $0.10 fee or something like that? Or would that model even work technologically?

A lot of companies wouldn't swing for that. If I could get a single player AAA title for, let's say $5, what's to stop me from doing a 24-hour gaming marathon, beat the whole game, and then put it away. The company makes $5.10 off a game they would've sold for $60. World of Warcraft does a subscription service, but they also charge full-retail upfront (unless you get a sale of course), so they get the maximum profit up front, then the subscription is just icing (well except for server maintenance costs). Microtransactions within a game seem to be where it's heading, but again you're usually paying full retail upfront, then doing microtransactions to get ahead in the game without doing the actual work.

Multiplayer would be your best bet, but again that's assuming you can keep them coming back for enough days to turn a profit, and knowing how ADD most gamers are, they've moved on to the next big title in about a month or two.

If you want to see the very dark side of microtransactions, check out Final Fantasy: All The Bravest. This is a shameless cashgrab and deserves to be ridiculed for being pure trash.

SurfaceTension:Why isn't there a game system that institutes a pay-for-play system where you pay a small fee to get the game, but each time you start the game, the system has to be connected to the internet and you pay a $0.10 fee or something like that? Or would that model even work technologically?

I do I need to be connected to the Internet to play a single player game?

What if my Internet is out and I need something to do?

Why does the model have to change when it has worked for decades? Innovation and good game should be the reason you buy a new game.

For the people who think this could lower prices, do you really think big companies will do that? How big of a change is it between Madden '12 and Madden '13 and yet one is more than twice the price

Gig103:WalkingCarpet: I seriously doubt this is true, it would be the death knell for the Xbox brand and Microsoft must know it.

Yeah, but Microsoft seems to be run by inept monkeys these days. Look at Office 360 and Windows 8. In the latter case, not only are they forcing a UI on people, but despite sales slumps the price recently went UP.

I think either both companies do it or none of them do it as the one who doesn't do it will have a huge advantage.

I guess we'll find out more when Sony unveils the PS4 on the 20th (or not, I don't think something like this would be featured in an announcement event).

WalkingCarpet:I seriously doubt this is true, it would be the death knell for the Xbox brand and Microsoft must know it.

Yeah, but Microsoft seems to be run by inept monkeys these days. Look at Office 360 and Windows 8. In the latter case, not only are they forcing a UI on people, but despite sales slumps the price recently went UP.

Beerguy:HulkHands: Beerguy: [images.wikia.com image 300x300] [www.userlogos.org image 300x225] Are you saying they are good alternatives, or pointing out that they don't accept used games, either?

I am saying that once you own a game on either Steam or G.O.G., you own the game for life and can download it as many times as you like.Steam is also producing the SteamBox console which will give you access to your Steam account and thus all your games so you can play them on your TV."Why Valve's Steam Box is a console killer"

And as soon as steam starts getting in the way of Sony or Microsoft, they'll fall down an elevator shaft and land on some bullets. I don't trust the big boys in the industry. they play ROUGH!

There's a couple of game franchises that I've gotten into because I picked up an earlier game in the series used, then bought the sequels brand new as soon as they came out.

"Hey, have you played that? It's awesome!""I saw the ads, I thought it looked dumb.""Dude, try it.""Eh, not for $60. Hmm, they have a used copy...""Trust me.""Oh wow, this is farking amazing! Part 2 comes out next month? I'm pre-ordering that shiat!"

Yeah,,,not going to happen. Unlike a website paywall, which requires only a small investment and still doesn't pay off very well, this is a HUGE investment. And all the other guy has to do to kill you is say 'hey...no paywall'. End of game, right there.

No way this happens.

That won't happen because they also all benefit if they join up.

I don't know about Nintendo, but I strongly suspect Sony will join the ban on reselling games.

scottydoesntknow:So who's gonna be the first to cast the stone in the inevitable PC vs. Console flamewar that these threads always devolve into?

Can't happen here. Well, I guess it could, but I'd like to see how a PC gamer would argue against a company essentially adopting Steam's business model, except for consoles.

It would be too easy to implement- if you take your XBox 720 disc to a buddy's house, you'd need to sign in on his machine to make it work... something along those lines. Maybe a 2-form authentication, where you'd need, say, a controller that's somehow "assigned" to your home machine, along with the name and password...

Yeah,,,not going to happen. Unlike a website paywall, which requires only a small investment and still doesn't pay off very well, this is a HUGE investment. And all the other guy has to do to kill you is say 'hey...no paywall'. End of game, right there.

No way this happens.

unless of course ALL the major companies get together and (illegally) collude to lock down the console gamer market and make 'paywalls' an industry wide standard.